“You should be ashamed of yourself.”
For some people, just reading that brings on painful memories.
Parents, teachers, and other authority figures may have trotted this out at various points for a variety of reasons, but with one general purpose: to make you change.
It might be about a way you behaved in public, or a word you used, or perhaps goofing off in class.
Whatever it was, the intent was to make you feel bad.
Using shame in this way is so common that it’s an almost unquestioned tactic in motivating people to change. This use of shame occurs across countries, cultures, and religions. It seems to be part of the human experience.
But does shame actually help us? Does it make it easier for us to stop unwanted behaviours and do better?
The research on shame over the last several decades has been mixed. Some studies have found that feelings of shame can motivate positive behaviour change. When we feel ashamed of our behaviour, we tend to be motivated to change it. People have cited feelings of shame as factors that helped them quit smoking, lose weight, and treat their loved ones better.
In studies that examined factors that help people develop and strengthen good habits, participants have identified shame as a trigger to do things differently in their lives.
This would seem to support the practice of employing shame to produce personal change. If these results stood on their own, it might be safe to conclude that shame is a useful, even necessary tool.
However, there are conflicting reports about the long-term usefulness of shame.
While shame can sometimes drive a change in behaviour, there are consequences. These have been well-established in the social science literature and include depression, anxiety, uncharacteristic anger, and even some reduced function of the immune system.
In other words, a shamed person may get sick more frequently and for longer periods of time.
The negative impact of shame on the immune system especially might seem bizarre, even unbelievable, until we realize that our thoughts can influence our brain chemistry.
This includes increasing our level of stress hormones. While they can be useful in short bursts, they can cause our minds and bodies to degrade over time.
In addition, because shame typically results from people blaming themselves for personal characteristics that may not be their fault, it can actually cause perceived negative behaviours to increase. Individuals may lose hope that they will ever “be better.”
For some, experiences of shame can even trigger an externalizing reaction. That is to say that the experience of shame can be so powerfully negative that people look outside themselves to blame others for their own discomfort.
This has been found to be true in a number of interesting research studies, including some that examine the re-offence rates of prisoners after they complete their sentences. When feelings of shame cause them to externalize blame, they are significantly more likely to reoffend.
In these ways, shame may not be a motivator of change. It can actually be a demotivator, becoming a risk factor for the very behaviours that trigger feelings of shame to increase.
Why are the results of shame research so diverse? One issue in studying shame is that there is no single definition of the word that every social scientist has agreed on.
Words like shame, guilt, regret, or embarrassment may be used interchangeably by different social scientists but actually refer to distinct emotional experiences.
The research on shame has suffered as a result, with few researchers able to land on a consistent definition and informed perspective.
Few researchers, that is, until Dr. Brené Brown.
It would be hard to overstate the impact that Brown has had on shame research.
Her 2010 TED Talk, “The Power of Vulnerability,” is one of the most viewed TED Talks of all time. In it, she spoke of shame as an internal expression of self-worth, a running dialogue that tells us: “I’m not good enough… I’m not blank enough. I’m not thin enough, rich enough, beautiful enough, smart enough, promoted enough.” These self-beliefs are the core of shame.
Unlike the dissatisfaction we may feel regarding our health, past behaviour, and current circumstances, these feelings are connected to a person’s sense of value.
According to Brown, the shame we feel about ourselves can become problematic and self-destructive.
Why? Because these negative and disparaging beliefs about ourselves, at their core, are really about fear—fear that we aren’t good enough to be in connection with others, and fear that we will be alone.
Brown’s work was about more than shame, though. She also uncovered the opposite of shame. She determined that people who weren’t bound by shame were people who had the courage and vulnerability to be wholehearted with themselves and others. These people could reach out to others for connection, and reach towards themselves with understanding and compassion.
Having the courage and vulnerability to show compassion for ourselves, by practicing self-kindness over self-judgment, stops negative shame talk in its tracks.
It takes a great deal of courage to look at ourselves and say, “I’m enough.”
But doing so may be the motivation we need to make the desired changes in our lives, not out of shame but because we deserve to have good and wholehearted lives.
For those who have been trapped by shame, both in their internal dialogue and how they treat others, know this: you needn’t feel ashamed for this. You didn’t choose it.
Simply put, we use shame as a motivator for change in others and ourselves because we learned to do so, just as humans have learned to do for thousands of years.
There is no reason why we cannot unlearn it, and learn to motivate ourselves, our children, and everyone else in our lives through better, healthier means.
